A Strategy to enable Prefix of Multicast VoD through dynamic buffer allocation

In this paper we have proposed a dynamic buffer allocation algorithm for the prefix, based on the popularity of the videos. More cache blocks are allocated for most popular videos and a few cache blocks are allocated for less popular videos. Buffer utilization is also maximized irrespective of the load on the Video-on-Demand system. Overload can lead the server getting slowed down. By storing the first few seconds of popular video clips, a multimedia local server can shield the users from the delay, throughput, and loss properties of the path between the local server and the central server. The key idea of controlled multicast is used to allow clients to share a segment of a video stream even when the requests arrive at different times. This dynamic buffer allocation algorithm is simulated and its performance is evaluated based on the buffer utilization by multimedia servers and average buffer allocation for the most popular videos. Our simulation results shows efficient utilization of network bandwidth and reduced hard disk utilization hence resulting in increase in the number of requests being served.